Businesses and consumers desire security when transferring information between computing devices. For example, a user of a receiving computing device may request information such as digital content, sensitive documents, and financial information from a sending computing device over a network connection. The users of the sending and receiving computing devices do not want such information end up in the wrong hands. The users do not want information they send over the Internet to be received by an intercepting computing device that deceives the sending computing device into believing that the intercepting computing device is the receiving computing device. Also, the users of the computing devices are wary of identity theft such as theft of credit card numbers and/or personal identification information.
As one attempt to securely transfer the information between the sending and receiving computing devices, the sending computing device in one example encrypts the information to guard against spoofing and theft. For example, users of the sending and receiving computing devices employ shared keys to encrypt and decrypt the information so that if the information ends up at an incorrect destination (e.g., the intercepting computing device), a user of the intercepting computing device could not decrypt the information. As one shortcoming, the user of the intercepting computing device may obtain a copy of the shared keys or the user of the intercepting computing device may hack into the information without requiring the shared keys.
As another attempt to securely transfer the information between the sending and receiving computing devices, the sending computing device in one example confirms an internet protocol (“IP”) address that identifies the receiving computing device. As another shortcoming, the intercepting computing device may spoof the internet protocol address of the receiving computing device. For example, the information may be sent to the intercepting computing device attempting to appear to be at the internet protocol address of the receiving computing device.
Thus, a need exists for a network security component that serves to prevent an intercepting computing device from obtaining information sent between sending and receiving computing devices.